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MARYLAND HISTORICAL TRUST NR Eligible: yes DETERMINATION OF ELIGIBILITY FORM no x Property Name: Tipton Airport Inventory Number: AA-2380 Address: 81 General Aviation Drive (MD 198) Historic district: yes X no City: Odenton Zip Code: 21113 County: Anne Arundel USGS Quadrangle(s): Laurel Property Owner: Anne Arundel County, Tipton Airport Authority Tax Account ID Number: 4-000-90213642 Tax Map Parcel Number(s): 12 Tax Map Number: 20 Project: MD 198 from MD 295 to MD 32 Agency: SHA Agency Prepared By: EHT Traceries, Inc. Preparer's Name: Elizabeth Breiseth Date Prepared: 8/21/2007 Documentation is presented in: Maryland Inventory of Historic Places Form AA-23 80 Preparer's Eligibility Recommendation: Eligibility recommended X Eligibility not recommended Criteria: _A B _C _D Considerations: A B C D _E __F G Complete if the property is a contributing or non-contributing resource to a NR district/property: Name of the District/Property: Inventory Number: Eligible: yes Listed: yes Site visit by MHT Staff yes X no Name: Date: Description of Property and Justification: (Please attach map and photo) The Tipton Airport is a former United States Army airfield occupying a 366-acre tract of land historically part of Fort George G. Meade. The Tipton Airfield was opened in 1960, replacing the original Fort Meade airfield that opened in the 1920s. Operating under the auspices of Fort Meade, the non-historic airfield was designated for privatization under the Base Realignment and Closure Act (BRAC) in 1988. In 1995, the airfield was listed as a Superfund site and closed to allow the Army to cleanup the site. The facility reopened in November of 1999 under the ownership of Anne Arundel County. Currently, a state-chartered public corporation - the Tipton Airport Authority - operates the airfield.(l) Fort Meade, the National Security Agency, and the Patuxent Wildlife Reserve border the airfield, which is sited south of MD 198 in Odenton, Maryland. The Tipton Airport is a modern facility not associated with events that have made a significant contribution to the broad patterns of our history. The adjacent Fort Meade is significant for the part it played in mobilizing and training troops during World War I (1914-1918) and World War II (1941-1945). Constructed after the Korean War (1950-1953), Tipton Airport is not associated with any military events for which Fort George G. Meade is significant. Therefore, the property is not recommended eligible under Criterion A. The property is not associated with any person or group of persons of outstanding importance to the community, state, or nation. Therefore, the property is not recommended eligible under Criterion B. The buildings associated with the airport do not MARYLAND HISTORICAL TRUST REVIEW Eligibility recommended Eligibility not recommended V Criteria: _A B C D Considerations: A B C _D E _F _G MHT Comments: Ok**- Cb*JMMJtA& J tij&tjta. Reviewer/Qffice of Preservation Services Date Reviewer, National Register Program D^te NR-ELIGIBILITY REVIEW FORM AA-2380 Tipton Airport Page 2 embody distinctive characteristics of twentieth-century architecture. The buildings are constructed with materials such as concrete block and corrugated metal, typical of industrial architecture found throughout Anne Arundel County and the nation in the mid- to late twentieth century. Therefore, the property is not recommended eligible under Criterion C. All the buildings on the property are less than fifty years old. The property was not evaluated under Criterion D. Thus, Tipton Airport is not recommended eligible for listing in the National Register of Historic Places under A, B, or C. Historic Context: Anne Arundel County and Odenton Farming, primarily of tobacco, was the chief industry in Anne Arundel County during the eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries. In addition to farming, the northern portion of the county had an active iron ore mining industry following the Revolutionary War (1775-1783). Many railroad lines were laid in the early to mid-nineteenth century to aid in transferring the smelted ore to Baltimore City for shipping.(2) The new railroads also facilitated transportation of goods and people between Baltimore City and Washington, D.C, creating a highly traveled corridor through Anne Arundel County. Crossroads communities sprang up throughout the county around the new transportation corridors. For instance, the town of Odenton was founded in 1868 due to its location along the Baltimore and Potomac (B&P) Railroad, which connected Baltimore City and Washington, D.C. The B&P Railroad crossed the Annapolis and Elkridge (A&E) Railroad. At this intersection, a train station and post office were established and named for Oden Bowie, owner of B&P Railroad. Odenton was the largest of these small crossroads communities with 100 residents, a church, a school, and two shops by 1878. Early industry in the area was agricultural; farms produced wheat, corn, and tobacco. Canneries, primarily for tomatoes, were constructed in Odenton and throughout the county in the late nineteenth century. In 1917, the United States Department of War acquired 4,000 acres of land between Odenton and Laurel, in Anne Arundel County, for the establishment of Camp Meade, which was renamed Fort George G. Meade in 1928 when it became a permanent post. Conceived as a World War 1(1914-1918) training facility, the base offered training in infantry combat operations as well as a mustard agent training area. From 1918 to 1932, the United States Army Tank School operated out of Fort Meade. With the United States entrance into World War II (1941-1945) in 1941, Fort Meade expanded to 13,596 acres to meet the increased training requirements. The base continued to operate as a training facility until 1988 when several portions of the site - totaling 9,000 acres - were identified for closure under the Base Realignment and Closure Act (BRAC).(3) The establishment of Fort Meade spurred the early-twentieth-century development of Odenton and other neighboring towns. Growth in Odenton accelerated in the 1950s with the establishment of the National Security Agency at Fort Meade and Friendship International Airport, which is now known as the Baltimore-Washington International Thurgood Marshall Airport, a few miles north of Odenton. The suburban expansion of Baltimore and Washington, D.C. furthered the transformation of towns along major automobile thoroughfares like MD 198 and MD 175 from agricultural villages to business, industrial, and residential centers. The Fort Meade Auxiliary Army Airfield and Tipton Airport Tipton Airport, originally called the Tipton Airfield, was the second airfield constructed on the grounds of Fort Meade. The first airfield on the base, known as the Fort Meade Auxiliary Army Airfield, was built in the central portion of the base, two miles northeast of present-day Tipton Airport. The exact date of construction for the first airfield is unknown; however, an emergency landing field was present in the 1920s. An auxiliary landing field was noted in a 1930 Fort Meade publication, and the 1935 Washington Sectional Chart provides the first physical representation of the base's airfield. By 1937, the airfield had three runways, the longest of which was 1,800 feet.(4) The 1947 USGS map of Anne Arundel County shows the 1,800-foot landing strip of Fort Meade Airfield, which was sited north of MD 602 (present-day MD 198) and west of MD 175.(5) MARYLAND HISTORICAL TRUST REVIEW Eligibility recommended Eligibility not recommended Criteria: A B _C D Considerations: _A B __C _D _E F G MHT Comments: Reviewer, Office of Preservation Services Date Reviewer, National Register Program Date NR-ELIGIBILITY REVIEW FORM AA-2380 Tipton Airport Page 3 Buildings and roads increasingly surrounded the site of the original airfield, which had expanded in order to accommodate the increasing air traffic during the mid-1950s. Sometime around 1955, the 1,800-foot landing strip was extended to 2,485 feet. A report published about the base in 1957 indicated Mac Arthur Boulevard and Mapes Road crossed the airfield; the report also noted that the control tower operated moveable barriers that could be raised or lowered in order to facilitate air and ground traffic at the site.(6) Thus, the need for expansion and the increasing development around the site spurred the relocation of the Fort Meade airfield. Present-day Tipton Airport was opened in 1960 on the periphery of the base to provide the airfield with more room.(7) The new site for the airfield was two miles southwest of the original site and had once been a landfill. The 1961 Washington Local Aeronautical Chart noted the original airfield as "Abandoned Airport" one year after the Tipton Airfield opened.(8) The 1965 USGS map for the Relay Quad illustrates the presence of several buildings at "Tipton Airfield." The four hangars that are currently standing - #80, #84, #85, and #90 - are depicted on the 1965 map. Additionally, the control tower and the two administrative buildings were also standing by 1965.(9) The airfield operated under the auspices of Fort Meade until it was designated for privatization under BRAC in 1988.(10) The Army retained 900 acres of the BRAC parcel well into the 1990s, which included the 366-acre Tipton Airfield. In 1998, the Army began leasing the parcel to Anne Arundel County, eventually transferring ownership to the county in November 1999.(11) In July 1998, just as Anne Arundel County began leasing the airfield, the property was placed on the Environmental Protection Agency's (EPA) National Priorities List of most contaminated Superfund sites. Between 1995 and 1999, the Army removed 3,000 buried ordnance items. Ordnance items are military weapons such as artillery and heavy guns and shell casings. Two landfills were located on the parcel, both of which are currently inactive.

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